Cherokee genealogy and family heritage

I’ll bet you’re like me. Whether you’re Cherokee or not we have a few very important things in common. Let me tell you just a little about myself and see. One of my earliest memories is sleeping on a cot in front of the fireplace of a very old and cold log house. I was […]

Booker T. Washington wrote, “The Indians who first met the white man on his continent do not seem to have held slaves until they first learned to do so from him.” Cherokee and other Indian tribes were traded in slavery long before any arrived from Africa. South Carolina eventually became the hub of Indian slave […]

If you are considering a DNA test, joining the Cherokee Nation, or simply tracing your own Cherokee blood line, here is important information you should know. According to U.S. Census data, Native Americans intermarry at higher rates than any other group in the country. For many, this can mean losing tribal citizenship and federal benefits. The […]

Jackson Standingdeer (or Jackson Blood) was a medicine man from the community of Gwagwohi near Barber, Oklahoma. He was born June 1, 1870 and arrived in the Cherokee Nation from North Carolina on June 8, 1881. On July 9, 1921 he was ordained a minister of the gospel at the Sycamore Tree Baptist Church in […]

As told by Polly Fields. My grandparents were Richard Fields, early Chief of the Texas Cherokees, and his wife, Elizabeth Jane Blagg Fields; George Howard and Mary Carrol Ward. My parents were Ezekiel J. Fields and Sabra Elizabeth Howard. They were […]

In September of 1760 over 2000 headmen of the Cherokee met with Oconostota, Ostenaco, Attakulakula, and Standing Turkey in Nikwasi and decided to make peace with the British in South Carolina. They released ten captives and sent a letter to Governor Bull for a peace treaty. Lt Colonel James Grant was instead sent with 3000 […]

A Cherokee grandmother recently recorded the story that our ancestors were given blankets infected with smallpox during the Cherokee removal (Trail of Tears). Though thousands died during the removal west, there’s not hard evidence of a major smallpox outbreak along the many trail. Whether it happend on the trail or not, there’s reason to believe that […]

Example: There are genealogists who claim Moytoy never existed. Yet he is listed in thousands of Cherokee family trees. For many he is the last entry in their tree, as far back as can be determined. Those who venture further risk the wrath of traditional Cherokee who rage at the suggestion that the Carpenter name may […]

Let’s say that you want to join a Cherokee Indian tribe because you were told that grandma was 100% Cherokee. Using information from your family tree on an ancestry site you search the Dawes rolls (final Cherokee rolls), but she’s not listed by her maiden name, nick name, or married name. You visit genealogy blogs, and social […]